WordPress 7.0 Release Date & Features Guide 2026

Editorial correction (26 April 2026): An earlier version of this article said WordPress 7.0 would raise the MySQL minimum from 5.5.5 to 8.0 and gate the 7.0 update on database version. That was wrong, and we apologise. The official WordPress.org requirements page lists MySQL 8.0 / MariaDB 10.6 as recommended. The hard minimum is still MySQL 5.5.5 / MariaDB 10.4 (both well past End Of Life, both still functional). Sites on older databases will still be offered the 7.0 update. Thanks to the LinkedIn commenter who flagged this. The hosting requirements section, the FAQ, and the schema description below have all been corrected.

Update (23 April 2026): The WordPress release squad confirmed the revised schedule on 22 April. The new WordPress 7.0 release date is 20 May 2026. Key milestones: Host Testing call 24 April, RC 3 (treated as a beta) on 8 May, RC 4 on 14 May, dry run and code freeze 19 May, general release 20 May. The cycle was extended to rework the real-time collaboration database.

The WordPress 7.0 release date has moved to 20 May 2026. It's the biggest release since Gutenberg landed in 2018, and after a messy 2025 that saw legal battles, contributor walkouts, and a compressed release schedule, it's arriving with real-time collaboration, a native AI client, and a wholesale admin redesign.

The release is now in late-cycle RC testing. Here's the confirmed timeline, every major feature, and what you should be doing right now to prepare your site.

WordPress 7.0 Release Date: 20 May 2026

The WordPress 7.0 release date is 20 May 2026, led by Matias Ventura as Release Lead with tech leads Ella van Durpe and Mukesh Panchal. Beta testing ran from 19 February through five beta releases, followed by two release candidates in March. The cycle was then extended in early April to rework the database architecture behind real-time collaboration. RC 3 on 8 May effectively restarts late-cycle testing (treated like a new beta), RC 4 on 14 May acts as the new RC 1, with code freeze on 19 May and general release on 20 May.

The original plan had WordPress 7.0 shipping in 2025. That didn't happen. Only two major releases shipped last year: WordPress 6.8 in April and WordPress 6.9 in December. To understand why, you need to look at what happened behind the scenes.

What Pushed 7.0 to 2026

The WP Engine lawsuit changed everything. When Automattic and WP Engine entered legal proceedings in late 2024, it didn't just create headlines. It disrupted the contributor pipeline that WordPress depends on.

Automattic temporarily halted contributions to the WordPress project during the dispute. Since Automattic employs a significant percentage of core contributors, this created a capacity gap that made three major releases in 2025 impossible. The team opted for quality over speed, shipping two releases instead of three and pushing the major version bump to 2026.

The upside? WordPress 6.9 shipped in December 2025 with some strong features, including Notes (threaded, block-level commenting for editorial teams) and measurable performance gains across the board.

What WordPress 6.9 Already Delivered

Before looking forward, it's worth recognising what landed in 6.9 "Gene". These features lay the groundwork for everything 7.0 is building on.

Notes is the standout addition. It introduces threaded, block-level comments directly inside the editor. Your team can leave feedback on specific paragraphs, headings, or images without leaving WordPress. No more copying text into Google Docs for review, no more email threads about "the third paragraph on the About page".

Notes works asynchronously. Someone leaves a comment at 9am, a colleague replies at lunchtime, and the content creator resolves the thread that evening. For agencies managing client content, this alone is worth the upgrade.

WordPress 6.9 also brought the Abilities API, which gives plugin developers a standardised way to declare what their code can do. And under the hood, the hosting platform saw real performance improvements: faster page loads, reduced database queries, and better caching behaviour.

Confirmed Features in WordPress 7.0

Version 7.0 is the culmination of Gutenberg Phase 3, focused on collaboration since the project roadmap was laid out in 2021. After five beta releases, the feature set is locked. Here's what's shipping.

Real-Time Multi-User Editing

Multiple people editing the same post at the same time, seeing each other's cursors and changes live. Google Docs has had this for over a decade. WordPress is finally catching up.

"We're 100% aligned that 7.0 should provide realtime co-editing and better inline commenting. We have writers today that will collab in Google Docs on an article and then just copy and paste the whole thing into WP Admin."

Matt Mullenweg, Make WordPress Core, Phase 3 Update

I've watched this happen with our own clients for years. Teams draft in Google Docs, refine in Slack, then manually paste the final version into WordPress. A workflow held together by habit rather than logic. Real-time editing in WordPress removes an entire layer of friction from content production.

The catch: real-time collaboration needs persistent connections between the server and every connected editor. WebSocket servers are the most reliable transport, and most shared hosting environments don't support them. This feature works best on managed cloud hosting or dedicated server environments.

DataViews: The New Admin Interface

DataViews replaces the legacy WP List Tables with a modern, app-like interface for browsing and managing content. Posts, pages, media, and other content types get a consistent, faster admin experience with filtering, sorting, and bulk actions that actually feel like a modern web application. The dashboard itself gets a fresh colour scheme and updated typography.

Visual Revisions

A timeline slider in the editor lets you see and restore past versions of a post visually. No more guessing which revision had the text you want back. Scrub through the timeline, see the changes, click restore. Simple.

Customisable Navigation Overlays

Mobile menu customisation goes fully block-based. You can design and style your mobile navigation overlay using the same block editor tools you use for everything else. No more fighting with theme-specific mobile menu options or custom CSS hacks.

WordPress AI Client

WordPress 7.0 ships with a native AI client and an expanded Abilities API. Rather than building AI directly into core (which would tie WordPress to a specific provider), the AI client creates a standardised integration point. Plugin developers can hook into any AI provider through a consistent interface for writing assistance, image suggestions, content analysis, or server-side block generation. We've tested this first-hand in our field report on WordPress 7 Beta 2's AI Connectors.

Our sister site covers the WordPress 7.0 Beta 1 AI agent support in more detail, including what the first CMS with built-in AI agent support actually looks like in practice.

Enhanced Notes and Fragment Comments

Building on the Notes feature from 6.9, WordPress 7.0 adds fragment-level commenting. Instead of attaching a note to an entire block, you highlight specific text within a block and comment on just that selection. Think of it like Google Docs' suggestion mode, but native to WordPress.

"Technology is best when it brings people together."

Matt Mullenweg, ma.tt

WordPress has always been brilliant for individual publishers. Teamwork, not so much. The content creation workflow has been single-player since day one. If 7.0 delivers on its collaboration promises, WordPress shifts from a publishing tool to a content platform. For any team producing content at scale, that's a meaningful difference.

Hosting Requirements

Real-time collaboration puts new demands on hosting infrastructure. Here's what matters.

WebSocket support: Real-time co-editing relies on persistent WebSocket connections. Basic shared hosting typically doesn't support these. If your site runs on managed WordPress hosting with modern infrastructure, you're fine. Budget shared plans may not support the real-time features.

PHP 7.4 minimum (PHP 8.3+ recommended): WordPress 7.0 raises the minimum to PHP 7.4, dropping support for PHP 7.2 and 7.3. But the minimum is the floor, not the target. PHP 8.3 or higher gives you the best performance and security. If you're still on anything below 8.2, now is the time to upgrade.

MySQL 8.0 / MariaDB 10.6 recommended: The WordPress.org requirements page recommends MySQL 8.0 (or higher) or MariaDB 10.6 (or higher) for WordPress 7.0. The hard minimum is still MySQL 5.5.5 / MariaDB 10.4. Sites on older databases will still be offered the 7.0 update, but those versions are well past official End Of Life and present a real security risk. If you're on MySQL 5.7 or older, plan a move to MySQL 8.0, or, ideally, MySQL 8.4 LTS or MariaDB 11.4 LTS. The ones who get blindsided by major releases are usually the sites whose host quietly stayed on MySQL 5.7 because migrating thousands of shared accounts to 8.0 is expensive.

Memory and processing: Real-time editing with multiple simultaneous users consumes more server resources than traditional single-user editing. Sites with editorial teams of three or more will benefit from hosting plans with higher memory allocations.

For context, the WordPress 6.9 performance improvements already reduced baseline resource usage. Even with the added overhead of collaboration features, well-optimised sites on decent hosting should handle the transition smoothly.

How to Prepare Your Site for WordPress 7.0

You don't need to wait for the release to start getting ready. Here's what to do now.

1. Update to WordPress 6.9. Every feature in 7.0 builds on 6.9's foundations. If you're still on 6.8 or earlier, update first. Test in staging, verify your plugins work, then go live.
2. Check your PHP version. PHP 7.4 is the new minimum, but aim for PHP 8.3 or higher. If you're on 8.0 or below, you're overdue for an upgrade.
3. Audit your plugins. Check that every active plugin has been updated in the last 6 months. Abandoned plugins are the biggest source of compatibility issues during major WordPress upgrades.
4. Test your theme. If you're running a custom theme or an older theme that hasn't been updated recently, test it against WordPress 6.9 now. Themes that break on 6.9 will almost certainly break on 7.0.
5. Review your hosting plan. If you plan to use collaboration features, check whether your host supports the infrastructure 7.0 needs. We've put together a 7-point hosting readiness checklist to help you evaluate your provider.
6. Follow the Make WordPress Core blog. The official development updates at make.wordpress.org/core are the most reliable source for release dates, beta testing schedules, and feature confirmations.

The 2026 Release Schedule

WordPress is back to three major releases per year in 2026:

Release	Date	Focus
WordPress 7.0	20 May 2026	Phase 3 collaboration, AI client, DataViews, visual revisions
WordPress 7.1	19 August 2026 (tentative)	Refinements, expanded collaboration tools, third-party AI providers
WordPress 7.2	8-10 December 2026 (tentative)	Phase 4 groundwork (multilingual)

After the disruptions of 2025, this schedule signals stability. Three releases with clear focus areas, building iteratively rather than trying to ship everything at once.

Frequently Asked Questions